British Asian celebrities made a health video
British Asian celebs made a Covid-19 advice video (Picture: Getty/Rex)

British Asian celebrities have banded together to create a health advice video targeting the Asian community amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The video was made in response to reports of the critical impact of Covid-19 on black, Asian, and minority ethnic (BAME) communities.

Celebrities include EastEnders’ Nitin Ganatra, Naughty Boy, comedian Meera Syal CBE, Sanjeev Bhaskar OBE, Ameet Chana, Adil Ray OBE, Saira Khan and Shivani Ghai.

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Other stars include Abdullah Afzal, Ranvir Singh, Gurinder Chadha OBE, Jassa Ahluwalia, Shahid Afridi, Nina Wadia, Anoushka Shankar, Bhavna Limbachia, Shin and Anita Rani.

Dr Riyaz Patel, associate professor of cardiology at University College London, said one reason BAME cases are high may be due to living in densely populated areas with multi-generational families.

Adil – one of the organisers of the video – said: ‘We all felt that we had to do something during these unprecedented times.

‘It is evident that some of the advice and messages are not getting to some communities when they need it most. We hope that we can make even just a small difference.’

The video starts with Nitin talking to the camera from his home: ‘Without question, we are faced with the greatest threat to our lives in recent history.

Nitin Garanta
Nitin Garanta started off the video (Picture: YouTube)

‘For the British Asian community, the coronavirus maybe even more serious.’

The 52-year-old went on to say research shows that more than a third of patients who are critically ill in the hospital with the virus are from ethnic minority backgrounds.

‘We will look back at this moment and wonder what did we do to help?’ he said.

Future videos will also include Konnie Huq, Mehwish Hayat, Hardeep Singh Kohli, Krupa Pattani, Shobu Kapoor, Sonali Shah, Wasim Akram, Wasim Khan MBE, Adil Rashid, Archie Panjabi, Parminder Nagra, Nikki Bedi, Nikesh Shukla, Satnam Rana, Nitin Sawhney CBE, Lisa Aziz and Channi Singh.

A report by the Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre on the first 3,883 critically ill coronavirus patients found that 33.6% were non-white.

A total of 13.8% were Asian, 13.6% were recorded as black and 6.6% described themselves as other.

The death toll in the UK is currently over 16,000, with today’s daily jump in deaths of 499 being the lowest daily increase in two weeks.

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